1952 Peugeot BIMA re-build

[DM]

Or get the mag tested on something like this Octopus.

[Terrotmt1]

Cripes! They use those things in Sci-Fi movies!

Villiers Services have something similar, quite rare I think.

To the bike..
With no ignition of the fuel surely the plug should be very wet after 20 seconds of engine spinning? As it is the plug is only lightly misted over with fuel.

[Rex]

I wouldn't say "very wet" after twenty seconds of kicking. After all, with the British Standard kicking leg that's only maybe 10-12 rpm.

[mini-me]

All these old french bikes are pre set to fail after brexit, its called the manu effect.

You have no chance, best do the french thing and surrender.

Bon noel.

Agincourt salute

[Terrotmt1]

LOL @ Mini, happy Xmas to you too.

The bike has no kick start, so I'm using a good 240v drill with a 14mm A/F socket directly onto the crank, magneto side.
The engine runs in a clockwise direction, so simply engage the drill, hold on tight and pull the trigger, the engine then gets turned over at about 1000 rpm for as long as you like.
Better than a kick start....
Makes no difference if you pull on the throttle piston or not.

The French who have not yet surrendered, start their engines this way but theirs start within about 2 seconds.

As ever, here I am again.
Have fuel, have spark, have compression, but nothing works.

[mini-me]

clockwise, you certain? i know of some that run anti clock........................

[Terrotmt1]

Yep, checked it by engaging the engine friction drum to the back wheel and rotated the wheel in forward travel, the magneto went round clockwise.
The Terrot is anti clock.

[mini-me]

I have some very old  french cheese,  a bottle of sour  plonk and some rancid foie gras if you need to make your christmas complete?

[Terrotmt1]

Ha!
The bitter French taste will rest in the garage alone for a few days, then will start working it again.
It will all work out eventually! 

[Terrotmt1]

Well, it won't start as things are.
Decided to have the magneto re-magnetised and a new condenser, points look fine.
The carb is squeeky clean and I have compression. The decompression valve is working, ie is closed when free, and I do have a good spark.

Timing seems right to the 'handbook' the timing simply is the points are 'just' separating when the piston is 3mm btdc and the timing marks are co-incident.
Plug is damp after rapid spinning over of the engine but it will not fire.

Even when I dribble neat petroil into the carb mouth there is nothing. :|

Villiers Services do not open until next week, so will tinker with the Terrot.

[Terrotmt1]

Now with all the festivities over, back to the projects.

Made some positive progress.
Took the magneto to Villiers Services who found one magnet 'dead' and the others at the low end/dead of the meter range, so those were done. A new Wipac condenser and new plug came home with me for £30.90.
Re-installed the lot and put the drill on the engine.
Nothing fired.

Put a shot of neat fuel mix into the spark hole, refitted the plug quickly and gave it the drill-start and had a few good fires before petering out to nothing, thus the issue now is the fuel supply. The carb isn't working.
Stripped it again and poke through every hole, but noticed that the hole from the engine side of the carb (call it hole A) is clear on its way to the atomiser but stops dead and short of the atomiser itself.

On the net found a cut away of the Gurtner D10 carb and the atomiser has a vertical drilling to the fuel supply that is clear but there is also a side drilling to the vertical drilling and the hole A as above.

This Hole A must bring some pressure/vaccum to the atomiser when the engine is running.

Thus I need to clear this cross hole in the atomiser, BUT the atomiser is not removable, it is a press fit into the carb body, so the access to the cross drilled hole is not possible!

The body is now humming in an US bath over night and I hope this will do the trick. If not, it is another carb...

But, at least is fired a few seconds!

[Terrotmt1]

Considerable progress!


Put the carb body in the ultra sonic bath for 5 hours. There is one small drilling in the venturi jet that you can't poke through, so that might be the culprit I thought.
Oddly, bought a NOS carb body of UK Ebay for £13, awaiting delivery.

Just put the carb back together and all on the engine. Nothing.

Put a slug of near petroil down the plug hole and span it over for about 10 seconds and it fired, and it ran, and it throttled (quite well).

It even re-started on it's own without the neat fuel slug and I blipped it (odd phrase for a 50cc 1.5 bhp engine...) for a good time and tested tick over which killed it.

Decided to call it a day with a few thoughts.
1
I think the very effective silencer is very choked with carbon and stifling the engine,
2
I think the carb clean is 50% done, the NOS body should be the fix.
3
Time to order all the bits to get the bike road worthy.

[Terrotmt1]

Considerable positive progress over the last few weeks and the BIMA is nearly done.

The NOS carb off ebay proved to be perfect, brand new part in perfect condition and with a new well earthed condenser the engine fired and ran well and even settled to a good tick over.
I decided to clean out the silencer by opening up the top (which was paper thin due to rust) and replaced with fresh steel.

The new tyres, tubes and cables added next but awaiting new brake blocks and pedal arm cotter pins.
Feeling riding a bike today is a dangerous business I bought some simple led cycle lights and converted a period looking front lamp to white and simply clipped the red one onto the pannier frame. No batteries, just re-charged via a USB port.

This stuff is so cheap.

Made a number plate to fit to the un-restored original saddle, and hope to hand paint the reg number today.

A few more hours and it will be done and I will wait a few weeks for Spring to arrive in people's minds and try to sell both.

[Rex]

When I saw the top pic I thought you'd fitted two engines.
What's the next piece of exotica on the menu after this one?

[Terrotmt1]

Ah, yes, it does too!

Next?
Not sure really. would like to do another old(er) bike with girder front forks but finding suitable material is very hard now even if you ignore price.
Bikes at big shows are also pricey and seem very incomplete.

My interest in model aircraft has been re-kindled recently, so I think a year off the 'heavy' stuff would be good to allow my body to recover. Too many joints complaining after 55 years of messing with scooter and cars and French follies.

Another Lambretta or Honda beckons mind, but they are expensive to restore.

The Peugeot here is my first 'oily-rag' re-build and has been odd, but certainly is cheap and fast!

The Lambretta takes me back to a mis-spent youth and the Honda to when I wanted one of the modern Japanese, leak-free electric starting rockets...

Previous restorations: